Overview

This award aims to address the learning needs of healthcare professionals working with patients with cardiac conditions by providing opportunities for practitioners develop and enhance their theoretical knowledge and critical thinking skills in order to best meet the needs of their clients and the service.

What's covered in the course?

You'll learn more about assessing, planning, delivering and evaluating the specialist care of patients undergoing treatment for a variety of cardiac conditions, and educating and supporting these patients, their relatives and colleagues. We'll also facilitate your development of higher levels of judgement and decision making, and provide opportunities for you to enhance your understanding and expertise in your clinical area using reflection and critical evaluation of evidence based practice.

The modules are delivered by a qualified nurse with extensive experience in cardiac care and course delivery, supported by colleagues from clinical practice.

The modules focus on ECG interpretation and management of associated conditions as well as acute and long term cardiac conditions including acute coronary syndrome and heart failure.

Why Choose Us?

Clinically focused content

An opportunity to examine your practice critically

A strong focus on current issues and an emphasis on the practical application of knowledge

Flexible study options – chose to study over one or more academic years

Each module has a bespoke "Moodle" based website which contains all module documentation, handouts, news feeds, links to key documents and supplementary articles of interest

Ongoing support from staff academically whilst in university to facilitate your development as a learner.

New £10,280 postgraduate loans

If you are completing the MSc Professional Practice, you may be able to take advantage of the government’s plans to make loans of up to £10,280 available for postgraduate study.

Post Registration Education Provider of the Year Winner

UK or EU students

If you're unable to use the online form for any reason, you can complete our PDF application form instead.

International Students

Award

Start

Mode

Duration

Fees

TBC

PT

TBC

See below

The University reserves the right to increase fees in line with inflation based on the Retail Prices Index or to reflect changes in Government funding policies or changes agreed by Parliament.

Course structure

You can choose to study this programme as a complete pathway award (full or part-time) or as a standalone module, dependent on your individual need and the needs of your organisation. All programmes offer a convenient part-time format to fit around home and work commitments.

Pathway awards in Cardiac Care can lead to:

Module only Professional Practice Level 6

Module only Professional Practice Level 7

BSc Professional Practice

BSc (Hons) Professional Practice

Grad Cert Professional Practice

PG Cert Professional Practice

PG Dip Professional Practice

MSc Professional Practice

How to apply

Complete the online application form via the link above, including the name of the pathway or module you are enrolling onto.

This course is available part-time

Got any questions?

Degree (Level 6)

How it works

You can choose to study this programme as a complete pathway award or as a standalone module.

Acute Cardiac Conditions

20 credits

This module is aimed Practitioners who provide care and manage patients with Acute Cardiac Conditions in their daily practice, often, although not exclusively within specialist settings. It will provide opportunities for you to develop your knowledge of the underlying physiology of a number of conditions, and critically investigate evidence based, best practice management of these conditions.

Long Term Cardiac Conditions

20 credits

This module is aimed at Health Care Practitioners who provide care and manage patients with Long Term Cardiac Conditions in their daily practice, in a variety of clinical settings. It will provide opportunities for you to develop an in depth knowledge of the underlying physiology of a number of cardiac conditions, and critically explore evidence based, best practice management of these conditions.

ECG

20 credits

This module is aimed at Practitioners who utilise Cardiac monitoring and ECG interpretation in their daily practice. It will provide opportunities for you to develop an in depth knowledge of the ECG, enhance your knowledge and decision-making skills in relation to arrhythmia and conduction disturbance recognition and evidence based best practice management.

Rapid

20 credits

This module allows you, a registered healthcare practitioner caring for acutely ill adults, to enhance your ability to recognise, assess and interpret physiological indicators of acute deterioration. This will enable you to confidently recognise early signs of physiological deterioration, and articulate your concerns to others.

Using Research Evidence in Practice

20 credits

This module gives you the opportunity to:

Examine the process of devising an answerable question arising from clinical practice.

Implement strategies for accessing and retrieving sources of relevant evidence.

Critically analyse and evaluate sources of evidence using appropriate frameworks.

Demonstrate a critical understanding of the knowledge and skills required to successfully implement evidence into practice.

Analyse how this learning has supported or developed knowledge and practice.

Postgraduate (Level 7)

Acute Cardiac Conditons

20 credits

This module is aimed Practitioners who provide care and manage patients with Acute Cardiac Conditions in their daily practice, often, although not exclusively within specialist settings. It will provide opportunities for you to develop your knowledge of the underlying physiology of a number of conditions, and critically investigate evidence based, best practice management of these conditions.

Long Term Cardiac Conditions

20 credits

This module is aimed at Health Care Practitioners who provide care and manage patients with Long Term Cardiac Conditions in their daily practice, in a variety of clinical settings. It will provide opportunities for you to develop an in depth knowledge of the underlying physiology of a number of cardiac conditions, and critically explore evidence based, best practice management of these conditions.

ECG

20 credits

This module is aimed at Practitioners who utilise Cardiac monitoring and ECG interpretation in their daily practice. It will provide opportunities for you to develop an in depth knowledge of the ECG, enhance your knowledge and decision-making skills in relation to arrhythmia and conduction disturbance recognition and evidence based best practice management.

Rapid

20 credits

This module allows you, a registered healthcare practitioner caring for acutely ill adults, to enhance your ability to recognise, assess and interpret physiological indicators of acute deterioration. This will enable you to confidently recognise early signs of physiological deterioration, and articulate your concerns to others.

Research: Methods of Enquiry

20 credits

You will be provided with quantitative and qualitative research methods that will satisfy your learning needs. You will identify a population and sample, consider methods of data collection and analysis, strengthen credibility and apply ethical principles, providing a sound foundation for your final Masters project.

Leadership Skills and Project Management for Health

20 credits

Through a flexible provision, on this module students are inspired to reflect critically upon their individual learning needs as well as their organisations’ practices, to appraise and apply concepts from the literature on leadership, to issues of relevance for their role, organisation and overall programme of study.

This module also focuses on pursuing excellence in leadership and project management principles and encouraging practice-led, applied knowledge for students to lead service improvement and/or policy change effectively and efficiently.

Research Dissertation

60 credits

For those undertaking MSc only. The dissertation module gives you the opportunity to:

Initiate, plan and design an investigation into an academic area of professional practice

Conduct an academic study considering its theoretical underpinning and offer insight into an area of professional practice

Demonstrate the ability to analyse, synthesise and evaluate findings appropriate to the study undertaken

Critically reflect on the processes undertaken as part of the study and offer creative solutions for future studies.

Our Facilities

We are constantly investing in our estate and are currently in the process of spending £260 million on new learning facilities.

We boast up-to-date, innovative facilities that simulate the real situations that medical staff may come across.

These resources are essential in offering students a hands-on introduction to health and social care practice. Much of our teaching is carried out within our state-of-the-art, £30m Seacole Building, which houses some of the best learning facilities in the UK.

In a sector where new techniques are constantly being discovered, we work hard to ensure that students learn using the most up-to-date equipment available. These include the only mock operating theatre in an English university and a cutting-edge radiography virtual clinical training facility, virtual ward and virtual case creator.

Virtual Case Creator

For pre-registration midwives, Virtual Case Creator software contains a range of scenarios to let you experience birthing situations and decide on appropriate interventions in a safe environment.

Hospital Ward

Our mock wards enable you to get a feel of what a ward is really like before you head out for your first placement. They contain ‘Sim Men’, which are demonstration dummies that develop ailments, allowing you to treat them as you would a real patient and build your confidence in reacting to the changing needs of patients.

The Hospital Ward can be adapted from a low care to high dependency care environment with the necessary monitoring equipment.

Part of the package is our SIM baby, SIM man and Mega code kid. There are also nursing manikins for fundamental skills teaching and various equipment to support essential skills teaching, such as blood pressure monitoring venepuncture and cannulation equipment.

Skills Practice and Clinical Enhancement facility

The SPACE (Skills Practice And Clinical Enhancement) learning facility lets you further practice the skills taught in class, at your own pace and convenience.

It is fully stocked with the specialist items and equipment needed for procedures such as taking blood pressure, giving an injection, abdominal examination of a pregnant woman and caring for ill babies in an incubator.

Biomedical Laboratories

We have recently installed new laboratory facilities to help you explore understand the scientific principles underpinning many of our courses. The physiology laboratory is equipped to help you learn about the way the human body works by performing investigative experiments. The biomedical science laboratory is undergoing an upgrade over the summer and will allow you to learn about anatomy, cellular processes, immunology and enzymology in a hands-on way that links directly to day-to-day health care.

Simulation Mannequins

We have several Simulation men (SIM men) and Simulation babies (SIM babies) which are leading edge, anatomically correct mannequins used for teaching specific techniques such as advanced adult and paediatric life support skills, acute and high dependency clinical skills, first aid and communication skills.

The SIM men and SIM baby mannequins are complete with software, which is used to replicate real symptoms, and are enhanced by the manipulation of for example blood pressure, pulse and heart rate for extra realism. SIM Man can also “talk” to the students which adds another dimension to their use in teaching clinical skills and in simulation exercises.

Mary Seacole Library

The Seacole library, based at City South Campus, is one of the UK's largest specialist health education libraries. The state-of-the art facility offers an extensive range of range of information and reference materials set out in a relaxing environment, conducive to studying. There are comfortable seating areas, group study areas, a silent study area and private study rooms.

You will have access to all of the University’s libraries, including the main Kenrick Library on the City North Campus, which is open for almost 90 hours a week and holds more than 320,000 books, 2,000 print journals and carries more than 4,000 electronic journals online.

Computer Facilities

The Seacole building houses a large open access IT Suite which comprises of 96 PCs, full colour printers, photocopiers and scanners. Our PCs utilise the latest Intel i5 core technology, all with:

Fast (unrestricted) internet connectivity

Ability to save files to USB, DVD & CD

Microsoft Office software

Research and statistical software

Storage space which can be accessed from any PC across the University and from home

Our PCs are also designed to support students who may have difficulties with reading and writing, featuring specialised software with zooming/magnification and screen reading capabilities, which may also be customised for individual student needs.

The IT Suite offers extended opening hours and is supported by a specialist Open Access Assistant during term time. In addition to the open access PCs within the IT Suite, there are 12 networked student PCs available within Seacole library.

Simon Dobbs

Senior Lecturer

Simon has been delivering BCU’s post registration Cardiac courses since 2003 and has overseen their development from diploma awards to the current provision at Level 6 and 7. In addition he is part of the Dimensions in Health Care (now Professional Practice award) programme team, facilitating the provision of a variety of BCU’s post registration awards.

Simon qualified as a Nurse in 1991 and worked exclusively in Acute Cardiac environments, predominantly Coronary Care Units in Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds.

He completed the ENB 124 in Coronary Care Nursing as well as a Post Graduate Diploma in Cardiology and Education (part of his Masters of Education in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education). Simon currently holds Advanced Life Support provider status.

He delivers modules (and sessions) on both Acute and Long Term Cardiac Conditions with a particular interest in ECG interpretation, associated condition management and Heart Failure.

Enquiries

For any enquiries about this course please contact the course leader Simon Dobbs, on:

International Enquiries

Professional Navigator

The Professional Practice Programme consists of a selection of modules that can be studied on their own or as part of an award. For help in deciding which modules to study or your outcome award please contact our Professional Navigators on navigator@bcu.ac.uk

Professional Practice Routes

Have a look at all of our Professional Practice Healthcare routes available